


No Sunshine

by royal_chandler



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Hopeful Ending, Imported, LiveJournal, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-27
Updated: 2010-01-27
Packaged: 2019-01-30 16:39:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12657366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/royal_chandler/pseuds/royal_chandler
Summary: Jim flinches. He swallows the instinct to call Bones a coward, to make him stay and smash everything in this godforsaken house.





	No Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](https://st-respect.livejournal.com/profile)[st_respect](https://st-respect.livejournal.com/). Prompt: Ain’t no sunshine when she’s [he’s] gone. This was beta’d by the wonderful [](https://near-family.livejournal.com/profile)[near_family](https://near-family.livejournal.com/), who has a great eye, is quite fantastic and amazing.

Jim watches in confusion as his lover goes to the coat rack. “Bones, what are you doing?”

“I’m going for a walk if that’s okay with you.”

“What? We should talk about this instead of ignoring it. Bones. _Bones_. God, would you just talk to me?”

“It can wait, Jim.”

“No, it can’t.”

“Jim…" It's almost patronizing.

“It can’t fucking wait, Bones!” Jim finally snaps.

It can’t because it will fester. All of the anger and the hurt will fester, mutate and boil over until it eats them both—disintegrating them into ashes of their former selves. And it kills Jim, makes him paranoid because he seems to be the only one who recognizes the damage that waiting could cause. He’s done it before—sweeping things under the rug—and he’s never walked away without scars. Jim doesn’t ever want that with Bones. With the man who has become air to his lungs and the pulse in his veins? It’s incomprehensible and the possibility of it is already destroying him.

Jim sees the tightening of Bones’ lips, can tell that he’s having to restrain himself from whatever he means to say, hands white-knuckling his coat. But then the grip lessens, defeated. The response Jim gets is gravelly and completely broken—foreign to anything he’s ever heard escape Bones’ mouth. It shreds Jim’s heart into ribbons. “I need to clear my head, Jim.”

Jim flinches. He swallows the instinct to call Bones a coward, to make him stay and smash everything in this godforsaken house.

He can feel it though, in every cluster of his spine, that this fight is different. It won’t be fixed overnight. This isn’t about random patterns of bruises that mar Jim’s skin; it’s not about Bones’ tendency to work too late in sickbay. Ironically enough, they’re on shore leave and away from the normal order of their lives, leaving them without a way to blame this on the contained space in the Enterprise. It’s deeper and more organic—makes the situation harder to heal…if it ever can be. And that doubt, that off-chance scares the fuck out of Jim because that’s never been _them_. They don’t do this. Jim and Bones have never been dragged down to the point of this aching despair. They’re best friends above all else and until now that’s always kept their relationship solid. But the foundation is quaking right where they stand and getting the best of them.

Everything in his body tells him not to but he concedes with a croaked, “Yeah, go ahead. It’s fine.”

Jim’s a pretty good liar when he wants to be but the words couldn’t be anymore clumsy.

Bones shrugs into his coat and goes to leave. He’s got the knob in his hand when Jim speaks again. “I, uh, checked the weather report this morning, was planning to…” It has no chance of happening now, doesn’t matter so he just coughs and hurries to the point. “It’s supposed to storm. You should probably take the umbrella if you’re going to stay out long.”

Bones sighs and Jim can’t keep the hope at bay, wants to believe so badly.

Thumbing at the corner of his eye, Bones speaks softly, “Some space between us will be the best thing.”

Jim can’t help the words that form, doesn’t even try to stop the bitter tone that laces his voice. “Was that your diagnosis for your previous relationship, doctor?”

“No, it wasn’t,” Bones admits, retrieving the umbrella from its stand near the door. He frowns. “But then again, I didn’t care as much then as I do now. I’m not abandoning you. Godammit, Jim, I don’t expect you to trust what I say right now and I can’t blame you but try to remember that I _do_ love you. I do.”

With that hanging between them, he leaves and takes the remnants of Jim’s composure with him.

The rejection stings in Jim’s soul, burns all the way up to the rims of his eyes.

He stands unmoving for a couple of minutes before going into the adjoining dining room. Jim covers plates of untouched food and pours champagne out of forgotten flutes. He doesn’t make any wishes while blowing out candles that decorate the table. Jim doesn’t stay long enough to see the smoke swirl from the wicks.

With a zombie-like creep, Jim heads up the stairs and ends up in the master bedroom. He toes off his shoes and strips out of his shirt and tie before crawling on top of the sheets. It’s unfair; he can’t even breath anything but Bones’ scent—rubbing alcohol, cotton, and bourbon. With blurry eyes, Jim finds the small black box right where they’d left it, atop of Bones’ pillow.

He opens it and can’t help the small smile that stretches his lips because it is perfect, his silver lining in this dark cloud settling over Georgia. He pulls the platinum ring between his thumb and index finger, extracting it from the velvet inside. “This is all your fault, you know that?”

Thunderclaps echo above his head while a flash of lightning illuminates it.

Jim chokes back a sob, laughs with a mouth full of water. “Well played.”

Lying on his back, he plays the ring on the tips of his fingers, eyes trailing the jewelry with a childlike wonder before letting it fall onto his pinky.

He’s on the verge of sleep when he starts to hear the patter of rain against the window. He prays that Bones is okay, an unconscious habit, then succumbs to the stressful day.

Hours later, Jim wakes up to a shifting noise in the room but he’s too exhausted to open his eyes, finds the warmth of the bed easier to deal with. Unbeknownst to him, the warmth that surrounds him is from the light that peeks through the blinds and shines bright on his face.

That Bones is the one to let the sunlight in.

**fin**


End file.
